If there was any lingering doubt, last week made it clear: The religious left is not a curious outlier in American politics. The religious references during President Joe Biden’s inauguration, the inaugural prayer service held Thursday morning with a powerful lineup of religious leaders and the swearing in of the Rev. Raphael Warnock as a newly minted senator are proof that progressive people of faith are a powerful force in American politics.
The religious left was galvanized during the deeply amoral presidency of Donald J. Trump. But it was the religious right that for the past four years has dominated the conversation. Trump relied on religious leaders like Jerry Falwell Jr. and Franklin Graham to rally his conservative base. He hired televangelist Paula White to serve as a White House adviser. Videos that surfaced from the Capitol riot showed just how intertwined an extremely conservative brand of Christianity has become with GOP ideology.
The above excerpt was originally published in NBC News.
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